Past vs Passed Learn English Vocabulary
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hi everybody my name is alicia in this
lesson i’m going to talk about
past and past these words can be
commonly confused because they have
very similar pronunciations but they
have different
grammatical functions i’m going to talk
about maybe some of the most confusing
points about these words
let’s get started okay first i want to
look at the word
past p-a-s-t so
past has a few different
parts of speech that it’s commonly used
in
in this lesson i’m going to look at past
as an adjective
as a noun and as a preposition
first let’s take a look at how we use
past
as an adjective so we use
past as an adjective meaning it modifies
nouns to mean something that happened
or existed before
the present so a reminder the present is
now something past is something that
happened
before now so yesterday
last week last weekend last year
so we use past as an adjective with a
noun
to explain something that happened or
existed
in the past some examples
which of your past jobs
was the most challenging which
of your past jobs was the most
challenging so here past
modifies jobs that means jobs you had
before so before now your past
jobs which of your past jobs in the past
was the most challenging the next
example
in past meetings we talked about
hiring new staff in past
meetings we talked about hiring new
staff here past is modifying
meetings so that means meetings before
now in those meetings plural in those
meetings
we talked about hiring new staff getting
new staff members
so past in this way refers to something
that happened
before now or it can refer to something
that
existed before now let’s continue
to the next use of past as an
adjective so we use past to mean
ago or time that has
gone by so let’s look at some examples
of this
first one i’ve been working
on this project for the past
two weeks i’ve been working on this
project
for the past two weeks
here you’ll notice i’m using this i’ve
been working pattern so this is a
present perfect progressive pattern
this shows us i started working on the
project
two weeks ago and i’ve been working
refers to continuous work
for those two weeks so that means my
start point was in the past
which i’ll talk about later my starting
point was two weeks ago
and i’ve been working i continued
working until
now the present so this refers to
time that has gone by so this time
period
we kind of explained that with
past the past two weeks this
the past two weeks means the
most recent the past two weeks the past
hour the past week the past month that
means this
most recent week or this most recent
time period whatever that is so the past
two weeks means this time that has gone
by
one more example of this we met
for a coffee this past weekend
this past weekend so again this weekend
that went by so meaning last weekend
in this case this past weekend i could
change this to say
we met for a coffee last weekend but you
might hear someone say
this past weekend so this past weekend
again
we know it means the most recent weekend
because it means
this so you might hear this or the
and that shows us the most recent of
that time period
so we use past in this way and this is
kind of a pattern you might hear more in
american english you might hear
slightly different uses that follow this
meaning
in british english okay let’s continue
to
one more point about the adjective use
of
past so we use past when it’s relating
to verb tense so i’ve used it maybe in
this lesson
when we want to talk about actions
before the present
and we’re explaining it in terms of
language we use the expression
past tense so for example i think i said
here
this is present perfect tense
we also use past to talk about the verb
tense we use
to explain past actions or past
existence
for example ate is the past
tense form of eat so the verb
eat in past tense is eight
eight is the past tense form of eat one
more example
please conjugate the verbs to past
tense please conjugate the verbs to past
tense conjugate means change the verb
form
so please conjugate the verbs to past
tense so when you’re talking about
actions or existence in the past
and you want to talk about the
language related word we use to do that
you can use past tense so
this is an overview of the adjective
uses
of the word past i want to go now
to number two here the noun use of the
word
past so as a noun in a sentence
past means the time before the present
so that just means any time before the
present we can call that
the past so for example the introduction
to this lesson
is in the past some more examples
he has a dark past a dark past so
dark means it’s not good probably dark
so it’s not light it’s not great it’s
dark so that means
his life before the present time
is dark one more example don’t think
about the past
don’t think about the past so that means
the things that happened before
don’t think about those things in the
past so
past as a noun means just any time
all the time before the present and
you’ll often see
the before past the past don’t think
about the past
because there’s only one sort of if that
makes sense it’s like
all time before now is the past it’s in
the past
okay so lastly here i want to talk about
number three which is the prepositional
use
of the word past i’m going to talk about
two points here first is using
past to mean after
after for example we’re past
small talk we’re past small talk
in this situation past means we’re
beyond small talk so for example
this sentence might be in a situation
where two people have become friends
maybe at first you use small talk how’s
the weather
how was your weekend very easy
conversations
but after time you become closer and
you can talk about more complicated
issues or you can talk about
deeper topics you can say we’re
past small talk this means our
relationship is
beyond or it’s after small talk we’re
past
small talk so this refers to someone’s
relationship we often use this to talk
about
activities or our relationships to other
people
another very common example is using it
with
time periods for example it’s half
past four it’s half past 4 that means
it’s 4 30. it’s half past 4 means it’s
half
after 4. so this prepositional use
of past means after after
finally then is this prepositional use
so we use past to mean
moving close to and then beyond
moving close to and then beyond so a
great example
is a car a car and for example a house
so the car moves close to the house
and then the car moves beyond the house
this is a very common example of how
this is used
so if we imagine the same idea with
these example sentences we can see how
past communicates that here he
walked past the restaurant he walked
past the restaurant so here if this is
my restaurant here’s a person walking
he walked past the restaurant
so this means he moved close to
the restaurant then beyond the
restaurant
he walked past the restaurant another
example they drove the boat past
the harbor they drove the boat past the
harbor
so again here is my harbor here is the
boat they drove the boat
past the harbor so that means there’s no
stopping
it was a continuing motion so past the
harbor or
past the restaurant we use past as a
preposition in this way this is a key
point of confusion
i think and i’m going to talk about past
in just a moment
so these are the main points i want to
talk about with
past as adjective as noun and as
preposition
okay so with that in mind let’s take a
look now
at past p-a-s-s-e-d
past so past is the past
tense form of the verb pass
so i talked about over here we use
past p-a-s-t to talk about
the language-related terms we use for
verbs so here past tense of the verb
pass so one point of confusion
that happens here is that this past
tense
past shares a meaning with the
prepositional use of
past i talked about here so
this to move beyond meaning this
is shared there’s one meaning of the
verb
pass which is to move beyond something
that is
shared with the prepositional uh past
use however just because the meaning is
shared does not mean we can use them in
the same way we cannot use
past and past in the same way we have to
create
different sentence structures so
let’s change these sentences i talked
about in the beginning of this lesson
to pass pass’s ed form
here he passed the restaurant
he passed the restaurant so i can use
the same example
i mentioned earlier so to move in a
direction
and then to move beyond something you’ll
notice
here there’s no like verb there’s
no hint about how he moved was he in a
car
was he walking was he jogging was he
skating we don’t know
we only know he passed the restaurant
somehow in this sentence he walked
past the restaurant we do know we know
he was
walking so this is your choice you can
choose
to use he passed or he walked past it’s
totally up to you
both are correct one more example the
boat
passed the harbor the boat passed the
harbor so again
same situation we don’t know exactly
how the boat passed the harbor did the
boat quickly pass the harbor
was someone driving the boat was the
boat just floating
drifting we don’t know but
this communicates the basic situation
the boat moved in the direction of the
harbor and then
continued beyond it so past
does share a meaning here but the
sentence structure
is different so please keep this in mind
all of these sentences are correct
but these sentences give us a little bit
more
information so we might use sentences
like these
when it’s very clear like for example if
if you’re waiting in the restaurant and
you see your friend
walk in front of the restaurant and
continue walking
you might think oh he passed the
restaurant like
you know he was walking so you might use
it in a situation like this
in a situation where it it’s important
to communicate
exactly how the person passed you might
use the past
pattern okay so this is
one point of confusion i think for many
learners
now let’s move on to another point this
is related to
time so when i talked about p-a-s-t
i talked a bit about uh how we use it to
express
time that has gone by we have a
p-a-s-s-e-d
form as well so for example
two hours passed two hours passed
here it’s being used as a verb again
this is the past tense of the verb
pass so two hours passed that means two
hours went
by for example i’m waiting i’m waiting
for an appointment
and two hours passed that means two
hours went by
i cannot say two hours p-a-s-t
that is incorrect this is a verb p-a-s-t
as we talked about here is an adjective
i cannot use it there
you could say for example i’ve been
waiting as i used here i’ve been waiting
for the past two hours that would be
correct
we cannot use p-a-s-s-e-d in this way
so again this may be a point of some
confusion
but keep in mind verb form two hours
past the verb is coming after the time
period
and past two hours or two weeks your
adjective
is coming before your time period
let’s look at one more example a month
has passed and i haven’t heard
from my client a month has passed and i
haven’t heard from my client
so here i’m using in this case again
present perfect tense so a month is my
starting point a month ago
a month has passed so in this time
period
i have not heard from my client a month
has passed so again this is the verb
form past i cannot use p-a-s-t
in this way i have to use the verb form
because this
is a present perfect sentence structure
a month has passed and i haven’t heard
from my client
okay i want to talk about a couple of
other points
about this verb past actually there are
many uses of the verb
pass i can’t cover all of them in this
lesson
but a very important point to note is
this one to refuse something or to not
accept something so when we’re in a
casual situation
and we want to refuse something in a
friendly way
we can use the verb pass like i’ll pass
or just pass so that sounds a little bit
friendly sometimes a little bit rough in
past tense we use past as i’ve talked
about
and we use often in many cases the
preposition
on before the item we refuse
or before the item we do not accept for
example
she passed on dessert she passed on
dessert means she refused dessert she
didn’t want dessert
she did not accept dessert she passed on
dessert
another example he passed on my offer
he passed on my offer he declined my
offer he refused my offer
so this means refuse did not accept
something
important to note though using
passed on with nothing after the
preposition
can cause some maybe very important
confusion or some very troubling
confusion
when we use he or she passed or he or
she
passed on it can refer to death
so we use the expression to pass on
to maybe more politely say he or she
died so he passed on last week means
he died last week if the context
is not clear you may cause some
confusion
if you just use on passed on like she
passed on
of course if you’re talking about like
work or a dinner situation
there’s probably a low chance of
confusion if you use
she passed or he passed it’s probably
not going to cause confusion
but there may be some situations where
it’s
very important to note
this part of your sentence so please be
careful when you use
past and passed on in this way
as i said there are many different
meanings for the verb
pass but i wanted to talk about some
that can cause some confusion
especially with the uh the word past
p-a-s-t as i talked about earlier in
this lesson
so i hope that this helps clarify
or i hope it helps make some things
clear about the differences between
these two words
remember the key differences are in
grammatical
structure in the parts that i focused on
in this lesson
specifically this part and in this part
too
so i hope that it was helpful for you
but if you have any questions or
comments
or if you want to practice making some
sentences please feel free to do so in
the comment section of this video
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